It took Irina Slutskaya years to get over her growth spurt and become a champion again. Ditto for Miki Ando. Caroline Zhang never got the magic back, and Mirai Nagasu tries and tries, but hasn't managed to get past her growth spurt.

Luckily for Gracie Gold, she hit her growth spurt before she became a household name.

Yeah, but my main point is that growth spurt isn't the same as confidence. Once people lose their confidence they can get it back but it's harder. Kwan etc didn't crash during puberty because they were no longer fearless (or at least strong willed competitors)- they crashed because they now had breasts.

Sasha Cohen is one who didn't really have a puberty issue, at least as a senior, but had problems with landing all her jumps throughout her career. To me puberty just is not the same as losing confidence because you're older. It is wrong to conflate the two and that was my real point (perhaps poorly said).

It took Irina Slutskaya years to get over her growth spurt and become a champion again. Ditto for Miki Ando. Caroline Zhang never got the magic back, and Mirai Nagasu tries and tries, but hasn't managed to get past her growth spurt.

Luckily for Gracie Gold, she hit her growth spurt before she became a household name.

Only one woman in the last thirty years besides Kwan managed her growth spurt: Katarina Witt. Then again, she didn't become dominant until she was 17, long past growth spurt age.

Where was Gold at the age of 14? Nowhere. Julia had an injury, concussion, growth spurt last year. Golds pcs is 60-61. Julias - 59. Not such a big difference...

To be honest, I don't think relative age should be considered when comparing skaters ability to each other. A good skater is a good skater, a bad skater is a bad skater, regardless of age. I just look at what they do on the ice and their seasons of progression. Shen and Zhao were superb at their age, Tara Lipinski was great at her age.

I hate it when people were like "When Skater A was 15, they were landing way more triples and were more of a household name than Skater B". Particularly when skaters start skating at different ages, go through puberty at varying ages, and even start accelerating their talent at different ages.

Even in terms of comparing their first junior season to another skater's first junior season, it's so pointless. I only really care about how the skaters are doing at this very moment. Not everyone will progress at the same rate or experience the same success or face the same level of competition or avoid injuries/puberty the same way. Like, who cares if Gold wasn't Julia's calibre at 14? Do people care that Takahashi wasn't Plushenko's calibre at 16?

Things are definitely looking up for Julia! She is almost guaranteed at least base value on all jumps and +2 or +3 on spins and was rock solid in finlandia. She can win SC possibly against clean Suzuki and gold.

I think Skate Canada Int'l is wide open at this point. Osmond has merely toned down her content but if she skates clean SP, she will be in top 3.

Russian girls get hyped all the time. So far, none of them prove to last longer than a season, if at that. There is a reason why Russia only has 2 spots in ladies for Sochi, same as Canada. Yet, if we were to listen to the hypes from years ago, you'd believe Russian girls would be going to Sochi as Worlds 1-2-3 by now.

Russia only has two spots because Julia wasn't there! She is by far the best and didn't bomb all season and her jr worlds performance was amazing compared the extreme awful disasters of tuktamisheva and sotnikova at sr worlds. Now she's crushing tuktsmishva by 20 points and probably sotnikova by 30 or 40 because her team is completely clueless and totally ignorant about what jumps to give her.

I don't agree with this. If clean, Akiko will do 1 fewer triple than Julia in the LP and Gracie will do as many, and both would outscore Julia on GOE in the jumps and PCS. I really don't get the excitement about Julia, she still skates like a junior.

Julia's only strengths are flexibility and consistency. Her jumps are poor quality and do not merit much GOE. I think she could lose her jumps (at least her harder combos) when she starts to grow out. But she should be able to beat the other girls at Skate Canada based on her consistency. All of her competitors are prone to making mistakes.

Here is how I think it could go:
1) Julia - consistency will get her first place
2) Akiko - better PCS than Julia, but will make too many mistakes to beat her, like at Finlandia
3) Kaetlyn - home ice boost, her PCS will rise like crazy to make up for her errors
4) Courtney - poor PCS will hold her back, but amazing jumps
5) Gracie - a headcase who is guaranteed to bomb at least one program, due to not being able to control her nerves.

I think Akiko and Gracie could beat Julia if they skate their best, but I don't think that's likely to happen.

Julia's only strengths are flexibility and consistency. Her jumps are poor quality and do not merit much GOE. I think she could lose her jumps (at least her harder combos) when she starts to grow out. But she should be able to beat the other girls at Skate Canada based on her consistency. All of her competitors are prone to making mistakes.

Here is how I think it could go:
1) Julia - consistency will get her first place
2) Akiko - better PCS than Julia, but will make too many mistakes to beat her, like at Finlandia
3) Kaetlyn - home ice boost, her PCS will rise like crazy to make up for her errors
4) Courtney - poor PCS will hold her back, but amazing jumps
5) Gracie - a headcase who is guaranteed to bomb at least one program, due to not being able to control her nerves.

I think Akiko and Gracie could beat Julia if they skate their best, but I don't think that's likely to happen.

I agree with you on Julia's strength and weakness. Unless her body changes dramatically in the past few weeks, I think for the moment she will probably win in SC.

I don't agree with this. If clean, Akiko will do 1 fewer triple than Julia in the LP and Gracie will do as many, and both would outscore Julia on GOE in the jumps and PCS. I really don't get the excitement about Julia, she still skates like a junior.

Gracie isn't a graceful senior skater on ice too, by the way. And her pc s is bull... , because her skating isn' appealing and her super speed isn't so evident compared to Julia. Watch them.

Julia's only strengths are flexibility and consistency. Her jumps are poor quality and do not merit much GOE. I think she could lose her jumps (at least her harder combos) when she starts to grow out. But she should be able to beat the other girls at Skate Canada based on her consistency. All of her competitors are prone to making mistakes.

Here is how I think it could go:
1) Julia - consistency will get her first place
2) Akiko - better PCS than Julia, but will make too many mistakes to beat her, like at Finlandia
3) Kaetlyn - home ice boost, her PCS will rise like crazy to make up for her errors
4) Courtney - poor PCS will hold her back, but amazing jumps
5) Gracie - a headcase who is guaranteed to bomb at least one program, due to not being able to control her nerves.

I think Akiko and Gracie could beat Julia if they skate their best, but I don't think that's likely to happen.

didn't you said that for 2 seasons now that as Julia grows she will lose her jumps, she in fact is growing yet she still has her jumps
at this rate even newer skaters like prepubescent Radionova has more chances of losing her jumps with those horrid flip and 2A